The first wave came at Seb, black-armored riders of the Wild Hunt, their blades curved and cruel, moving in perfect, silent coordination as they closed the distance across the shattered plaza. Seb's smile only widened at the sight of that armor, dark as a starless sky, edged in frost-pale filigree.
'Wild Hunt Riders.' Eredin's own riders, here, in the flesh. If they walked these streets, then he was in the right place.. and, he prayed to whatever gods still listened to a man like him, the right time as well.
The first blade came down toward his skull in a strike that would have split a lesser man to the collarbone, but Seb was already moving, sliding beneath it with fire trailing his boots, his own sword coming up in a rising arc that caught the rider across the ribs before the momentum of the missed strike had even finished carrying him past. The elf staggered, and Seb finished him with a second stroke, wreathing the blade in flame as it fell, so that the body crumpled already smoking into the dust.
"Fen'la vane, un dearg glaeddyv dh'oine!" one of the riders snarled, a burning blade, an unnatural human.. falling back a step even as three more surged forward to fill the gap, blades weaving in the tight, layered patterns honed over centuries rather than years.
He matched them anyway. Where their grace came from long practice, his came from pure mastery, flame licking along his blade's edge as he ducked one strike, let a second pass a hair's breadth from his throat, and drove his sword up through the gap in a rider's gorget with a move too quick for the elf to fully track. He spun with the momentum of the kill, using the falling body as cover from a fourth attacker's blade, and came up already swinging, fire arcing off his sword in a wide, scorching crescent that sent two more riders reeling back with their armor smoking.
"Cead a' dh'oine!" another hissed, backing a step, disbelief plain even beneath his skull helmet. "He fights like no human should.. "
"Then he shall die like every human does," a fourth snapped back, and attacked.
Seb caught the strike on his crossguard, twisted his wrist to send the elf's blade skittering wide, and drove a flaming palm flat into the rider's breastplate, the metal glowed white-hot in an instant, and the elf screamed, staggering back, tearing at the ruined straps of his own armor before Seb ended it with a clean stroke.
He didn't stop moving as every strike flowed into the next, sword and flame woven together into a single, unbroken rhythm, cutting a burning path through riders who had never once, in all their long centuries, faced a man who fought like fire itself.
When the last of them fell, smoking, into the wreckage of the plaza, Seb straightened, breathing hard, sword still burning faintly in his grip, and allowed himself only a single breath before breaking into a dead run toward the distant palace spires, flame igniting beneath his boots once more to hurl him forward in short, blistering bursts that ate the distance far faster than legs alone ever could.
He wove between startled onlookers and fleeing Aen Elle, over rooftops and through narrow garden paths, until the palace itself rose directly ahead of him, connected to the city by a single elegant bridge of pale stone arching over a moonlit river and it was there, at the bridge's near end, that he came to a sudden, skidding halt.
A wall of blue light stretched across the bridge's width, humming faintly, and behind it stood an elven mage in flowing robes, staff raised, flanked by a full dozen soldiers with blades already drawn.
Seb's boots scraped to a stop against the stone, sword lowering slightly. "If you value your lives," he said, in Elder Speech, "you'll let me pass."
The mage's eyes narrowed, and disdain settled over his ageless features. "Vile creature," he said, his voice cold and precise. "We shall not trouble ourselves asking how you came to walk these lands, nor who you might be, nor how a mere human came to speak our tongue at all. You shall simply die here, upon this bridge, and be forgotten by morning."
Seb smiled. "Elves," he said, still in flawless Elder Speech, sword igniting fully along its length once more, fire crawling hungrily up the steel. "Aen Seidhe, Aen Elle, it hardly matters which. Your arrogance is the very reason you'll always be the losing side, in the end."
.
.
.
Within the palace, word of the disturbance reached Caranthir within moments of the plaza's destruction, and he made his way at once to the high balcony overlooking the city, where Ge'els already stood at the balustrade, his robes stirring in the night wind, his gaze fixed on the distant glow rising above the rooftops. Beyond the palace's own shimmering ward, smoke curled black against the twilight sky, and here and there fresh bursts of flame flickered among the smaller structures nearer the ruined plaza, casting restless light across the elegant spires of the city below.
"What is happening," Ge'els said without turning. It was not a question so much as a demand.
Caranthir came to stand beside him, folding his hands behind his back, keeping his voice even, though his eyes lingered a moment too long on the fire below. "Fire, in the city as you can see. And reports of an intruder, I intend to see to it myself."
Ge'els's pale eyes narrowed, still fixed on the burning skyline. "Fire. And an intruder." He let the words hang a moment. "Tell me, Caranthir.. when was the last time flame spread through these streets? I confess I cannot recall it happening even once, in all my years of living."
Caranthir said nothing.
"Exactly so." Ge'els turned from the balustrade at last, silver hair catching the distant firelight, his expression carrying none of its usual warmth. "And I am considerably older than you, young as you still count yourself among us. So tell me plainly... what is truly happening here tonight? General Eredin spoke to me at length of the human girl, of the threat she supposedly poses, and yet I sense he has told me only a fraction of what he knows. What is he hiding, Caranthir? And is this somehow connected to it?"
"How could I possibly know such a thing," Caranthir said, smooth and unbothered, already half-turning toward the doors. "Allow me to go and investigate this intruder myself, and I shall bring you a full account the moment.."
"You will do no such thing." Ge'els's voice cut across the balcony, sharper now. "I shall send the Red Riders to see to the disturbance below. You will remain here, at the king's side, in case something further unfolds this evening.. and something unusual has already unfolded tonight, wouldn't you agree?"
Caranthir looked at him a long moment, something cold moving behind his eyes even as his expression remained perfectly composed. 'Ge'els. His loyalty to that fool of a king is so blind it borders on tiresome.' He inclined his head. 'No matter. The king dies tonight regardless of how closely you watch me, old friend.'
"Of course," Caranthir said aloud. "You are correct, as ever, Ge'els."
Even as he spoke the words, a fresh bloom of flame erupted somewhere near the base of the bridge connecting the city to the palace grounds, small but violent, flaring orange against the dark before subsiding.. closer now, far closer than the ruined plaza had been. Ge'els's gaze snapped toward it, his jaw tightening, and even Caranthir allowed himself, for the briefest instant, genuine worry.
Deep within the palace's inner halls, behind wards that should, by every right, have muffled all trace of the chaos outside, Avallac'h went suddenly, utterly still. His head turned sharply toward the distant sound, he felt it, a tremor of raw, restless power rippling faintly against his own senses that made his pale eyes widened.
He did not wait to seek out Ge'els, or Caranthir, or anyone else who might explain it to him. Whatever instinct moved through him in that moment answered to only one thought, sudden and absolute, and before he had even finished forming it into words, his feet were already carrying him at a dead run through the palace's silver-lit corridors, robes streaming behind him, toward Crilla.
/-\
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